“I’m terrified we won’t get him back in time,” I finally say. “That Aria will break him. That we’ll rescue a shell of the man we love. Or worse, that he’ll—” I stop. Can’t finish the sentence.
“He won’t,” Parker says firmly. “Silas is stronger than Aria gives him credit for. Stronger than any of us gives him credit for. He’ll survive this.”
“How do you know?”
“Because he has something to survive for.” She looks at me. “He has us. He has Noah and Liam. He has a family that’s coming for him. That’s more than he’s ever had before. More than his parents ever gave him. He won’t give up on that.”
“And if it takes too long? If we can’t trigger the trap fast enough?”
“Then we find another way,” Parker says. “We don’t stop. We don’t give up. We bring him home.”
She says it with such certainty. Such absolute conviction.
I want to believe her.
“What if we fail?” I ask, and the words feel like admitting defeat.
“Then we adapt,” Parker says. “We adjust. We keep moving. But Jace, you can’t carry every possible outcome on your shoulders. You can’t prepare for everything. Sometimes you just have to trust that we’re strong enough to handle whatever comes.”
“I don’t know how to do that.”
“Neither do I,” she admits. “But maybe we can figure it out together. Stop trying to carry it alone. Lean on each other instead of shouldering everything ourselves and calling it protecting one another.”
I huff a laugh and see the smirk on her face.
I fucking love this woman.
She leans against my shoulder, and I put my arm around her to pull her closer.
“I’m terrified Silas thinks I didn’t fight hard enough,” she whispers. “That he thinks it was easier for me to let him go, even though I was crying.”
“He knows better than that,” I say. “Silas knows you. Knows you would have fought to the death if he’d let you. He made a choice. Don’t take that from him.”
“Doesn’t feel that way.”
“I know.”
We stay like that. Sitting on the back porch steps in the darkness. Two people who’ve spent their whole lives trying to be strong are finally admitting they’re breaking under the weight.
“When this is over,” Parker says, “when we get him back, we’re all taking a vacation. Somewhere with a beach. Somewhere the boys can play, and we can just... exist.”
“That sounds nice,” I say.
“Maybe a trip on Scarlett,” she adds.
I smile at her suggestion. “I like the sound of that.”
“No excuses about work. We’re taking time off.”
“Anything you want, Princess.”
54
SILAS
Iwake to the kind of hangover you only get from a night mixing pharmaceuticals with head trauma—dry-mouthed, bone-deep ache, something sticky and uncomfortable bandaged at my thigh. I’m on my back, staring up at a hand-painted ceiling, some kind of neoclassical bullshit, and it takes three full heartbeats before I register 1) I’m not restrained, but fuck if there’s a single muscle that will twitch for me, and 2) I’m naked except for a threadbare sheet.
Since I can’t move, for a moment, I just breathe. Take an inventory. My left leg’s got a tourniquet cinched high and tight, field dressing still bleeding through, but the pulse is strong in my foot, and the color’s not blue. They patched me, probably kept me on ice. My chest is clear, ribs uncracked. Arms lay at my sides like a patient on an altar.
